Another explorer, Dr. Thomas Wather, was sent by the Loyal Land Company of Virginia and named the Cumberland Mountains and the Cumberland river in honor of the Duke of Cumberland, then Prime Minister of England. William Blount was named governor of Tennessee from 1809 to 1815. Tennessee celebrates Statehood Day each June 1; thats the date in 1796 when it was admitted to the Union as the 16th state. WebThe earliest mention of a John Francis in Washington County, Tennessee was in the minutes of the Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions dated 24 August, 1780. This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The author's ancestors, who first came to Sumner County, Tennessee, were the Hobdys, the Cottons, the Durhams, the Gillespies, the Perdues, the Mattoxs, the Cochrans, the Abshers and the Mayes. boundary of North Carolina, and that he would therefore need no 1769. The people called Melungeons on the whole denied the existence of such a group and when pressed on their racial lineage would claim Indian ancestry. Harrodsburg, Ky., and thence through Cumberland Gap. horses, mules and ponies. the first permanent white settlers, build a cabin on the Watauga River in Northeast Tennessee. One of the most interested observers in the State of Franklin was Don Diego de Gardoqui who had come to America in 1785, commissioned by Spain as a diplomat in the United States and with the American Congress. The waters of the Watauga River forms its boundaries to the north and the peaks of Buffalo Mountain, Jump Hill and Jackson Mountain border the eastern edges. One Cherokee Chief, Dragging Canoe, opposed the sale of the ancestral lands and established the Chickamauga tribe that harassed the settlements for twenty years. The first settler in Tennessee. By 1770 prices ranged from one dollar for deerskins to as much as five dollars for otter pelts. the men, should travel overland, and by an early arrival have Both of these prompted a sharp decline in the native Photo Courtesy of Biography.com. The invention of the cotton gin during this period contributes to the increase of cotton plantations in central Tennessee. Major General William S. Rosencrans, at the head of the Cumberland Army, marched from Nashville to Murfreesboro the 26th of December to confront the Army of Tennessee, led by General Braxton Bragg. All rights reserved. Chimney Top points towards the western skies and reminds you of lands lying elsewhere. The latter had founded the city of Louisville at The Parthenon of Nashville was constructed of bone, wood and brick. A manifesto of self-government (one of the first constitutions written in North America) for those who had moved to the area outside of the reach of organized government. It's fluid. Although the result of the battle was inconclusive, the Union Army drove back two Confederate attacks and the subsequent retreat of the Confederates was a very necessary incentive for the moral of the Union after the defeat at the Battle of Fredericksburg (Virginia, 1862) y denied the Confederate aspirations of controlling Central Tennessee. Just what information Robertson received during his visit is Delegates from all counties prepared a State Constitution and Declaration of Democratic rights with the intent of proposing the application before the Congress to be admitted to the Union. All Rights Reserved Powered by. In the region of Memphis: During the summer of 1795, the Spanish governor of Louisiana, Manual Gayoso de Lemos, acquired Chickasaw Indian lands. They came mainly from Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois. The outdoor drama Walk Towards the Sunset, produced outside Sneedville from 1969 to 1975, created an especially sympathetic view of Melungeons, while the Hancock County sheriff and deputies sported shoulder patches stating Home of the Melungeons and local restaurants sold Melungeon cheeseburgers. In 2001 the Hancock County Chamber of Commerce Web site invited tourists to visitHancock County, Tennessee, home of the mysterious Melungeons, offers numerous mountain byways and scenic panoramasand the Old County Jail was in the process of being restored as a Melungeon history museum. Late Ice Age hunters probably followed animal herds into this area some 12,000-15,000 years ago. The superstar country duo has lived in Tennessee for 17 years. Anthony P. Cavender, The Melungeons of Upper East Tennessee: Persisting Social Identity, Tennessee Anthropologist 6 (1981): 27-36; C. S. Everett, Melungeon History and Myth, Appalachian Journal (1999): 358-409; N. Brent Kennedy and Robyn Vaughan Kennedy, The Melungeons: The Resurrection of a Proud People (1994). Who were the first settlers of Tennessee? WebIn 1784, settlers in the Western Lands, created the small independent State of Franklin. Long hunters struggled for survival with the wilderness environment as well as with Native Americans. The garrison in Murfreesboro was camped in three locations around the city and included detachments of four units, infantry, cavalry and artillery, under the command of Brigadier General Thomas Turpin Crittenden, who had arrived the 12th of July. The states of Georgia and Tennessee wanted the remainder to leave. Initially a part of the new state of North Carolina following the Revolution, Tennessee made a bid for admission to the Union as a state named Franklin. Grant, after capturing Fort Henry (on the Tennessee River) marched his troops overland 12 miles to Fort Donelson (on the Cumberland River) and the battle was fought from the 11th to the 16th of February, 1862. The Indigenous Confederation was headed by Tecumseh and his brother the Prophet. caravan was on its way to Watauga, the route being to The principal objective was to attack Murfreesboro, an important railroad resupply center for the Union railroad from Nashville to Chattanooga, at dawn on the 13th of July. Treaties with the Cherokee and the Chickasaw opened fertile land for settlers in central Tennessee and the plateau of Cumberland. On the one hand, the word was still used as a pejorative for shiftless persons of low socioeconomic standing, while on the other hand many members of the local elite class identified themselves as Melungeons because of its exotic and romantic associations, encouraged in part by tourism promotion. Spain cedes the territory of Florida to the United States. As the settlers made their way from North Carolina and Virginia, they traveled along many hunting trails of the Cherokee and the Catawba Indians. Nashville transforms into a center of education and arts in the south. In a Confederate confusion during the battle, the Unionists retreated towards the northeast, toward Pittsburg Landing and regrouped in defensive positions under Brigadier Generals Benjamin M. Prentiss and W.H.L. Elihu Ambree establishes in Jonesboro the first newspaper in the United States that is dedicated to the liberation of slaves. The Washington District was now known as part of the Royal Colonies. Tennessee holds a vast amount of history and genealogy. Watauga. In 1838 the army of the United States is dispatched to evict them. the extinction of the large Ice Age mammals, and the spread of deciduous forests worked together to transform Indian society. animals. A group of seven Cherokee chiefs traveled with him to England to declare loyalty to the king. Blount College transforms into the University of Tennessee. This changed by the 1960s, as many of the residents in the Melungeon section of Hancock County gained better education through settlement schools and entered the middle and upper classes of the county, and as media interest in the mystery of the Melungeons created an opportunity for tourism development in Hancock County. The region officially became part of the United States with the Jackson Purchase in 1818, 22 years after Tennessees statehood. new settlement some of their number should go down to the upper He claimed the land for Spain, but it would be over 100 years later until Then in the month of July the Confederate Cavalry under the command of Forrest and Colonel John Hunt Morgan made incursions and attacks on Central Tennessee and in Kentucky. http://www.tngenweb.org/campbell/hist-bogan/tennessee.html, http://sos.tn.gov/sites/default/files/Pgs.%20499-555%20State%20History.pdf. The architect William Strickland of Philadelphia comes to Nashville to design and construct the new state capital. Other Confederate troops attacked the other camps of the Union command, the prison and Headquarters. By the 18th century, the only native peoples living permanently in Tennessee were the Cherokee. the beginnings of settled farming communities, the construction of burial mounds and the growing stratification of Indian society. William Bean and James Robertson were the early leaders of this group. Shawnee. Copyright August @2011 The following information is provided for citations. Humans first inhabited the land now known as Tennessee when the last of the Ice Age The tribal identities of the 16th and 17th century occupants of Tennessee are disputed. Tennesseans played a decisive role as volunteers under the leadership of Jackson in the Creek War, which erupted in 1813 and ended in 1814 at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend in Alabama. 4 Who was the first white man in Tennessee? There, finally, the Confederates managed to successfully stop the Unionists at the Battle of Ringgold Gap. . William Bean, supposedly the first permanent settler in Tennessee built a cabin on end of Muscle Shoals on the Tennessee River in North Alabama. With the expansion of the automobile industry Holmes business grew and eventually his products gained a world reputation for their quality and capacity. Evidently my Ancestor got there a little to late for the 1778 tax list , but here is what I found: Vachel Dillingham entered two tracts of land, in 1778, and in 1779. Together with other indigenous peoples of the southeastern United States, Tennessees native populations were routed via the so-called Trail of Tears to reservations in what is now Oklahoma. The University of Vanderbilt is founded in Nashville. WebWhen the first settlers came to the northern portion of Sumner County they found a vast, virgin wilderness. This territory was divided in three districts: two for eastern Tennessee and the district around Cumberland. later they were joined by a small company from the region of New Phone: 615-322-2527 The first British settlement in what is now Tennessee was built in 1756 by settlers from the colony of South Carolina at Fort Loudoun, near present-day Vonore. What was the largest Native American tribe in Tennessee? Similarly, the colony of South Carolina sent trade representatives into Tennessee and the Southeast. Elvis Presley graduates from L.C.Humes high school in Memphis the 14th of June. The Civil War had begun. Between 3,000 and 900 BCearly evidence shows examples of the cultivation of agriculture creating a secure food supply and the groups began combining to form villages. The Confederates were forced to retreat from the bloodiest battle in the history of the United States and lost the hope of blocking the Unions advance toward the north of Mississippi. The following information is provided for citations. The Chattanooga Campaign was a series of maneuvers and battles during October and November of 1863. One standout is the most ambitious speculators was Richard Henderson of Hillsborough, North Carolina. The English began their explorations in Tennessee when Abraham Wood, who operated a trading firm in Virginia, sent James Needham and Gabriel Arthur into what is now upper East Tennessee to establish trading relations with the Cherokees. In 1990 an article by chemist James Guthrie revisited the Pollitzer-Brown study, looking at the gene frequencies in five blood groups. Agriculture continues to be in the predominant industry in Tennessee, contributing food down river to the southern states that were concentrating their production on cotton and had to import their food. A HISTORY OF TENNESSEE - TENNESSEE BLUE BOOK. Kaskaskia, Robertson bought a drove of livestock, consisting of The first political leaders of Tennessee-Blount, Sevier, Henderson and Andrew Jackson-were dedicated to land speculation. Contents1 Who were the first settlers of [] Celebration year of the Bicentennial of Tennessee as a state in the Union since 1796. I have been able to discover 75 surnames from the time period of 1776 to 1782. This first group of settlers scattered in the central basin in search of land that could be cultivated. The Shawnee settled to the south near the Cumberland River. By the early 1770s, four different communities had been established in northeastern Tennesseeon the Watauga River, the North Holston, the Nolichucky, and in Carters Valley. The earliest documented use of the term Melungeon found to date is in the Stoney Creek Baptist Church (Scott County, Virginia) minutes for September 26, 1813. thereafter prevailed among the colonists. tribes. Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. Nashville was founded by James Robertson and a party of Wataugans in 1779, and was originally called Fort Nashborough, after the American Revolutionary War hero Francis Nash . The objective was to destroy the Union waterway defenses from Paducah, Kentucky to south of Memphis. This places the fort on its original position and preserves the history of its residents and the history that accompanies it. A final source of information about the region came as the result of political objectives, as was the case in the construction of Fort Loudoun, which was begun on the Little Tennessee River in 1756. The first settler in the area that is now Knoxville was James White in 1786. The state of Tennessee celebrated its Centenary (although a year late) with a great exposition in Nashville. First Settlers The first recorded settlers arrived in present-day Jefferson County in 1783. By the time Europeans returned to the area for further exploration in the 1700s, the principal indigenous groups were the Chickasaw, in the west, and the Cherokee, in the east. Edward Albright, Copyright, 1908, Brandon Printing Company, What steps did Tennessee take to become a state? Early History of Middle Tennessee, BY Photo Courtesy of Tennessee History for Kids. One group of Melungeon descendants is actively seeking recognition as an Indian tribe from the State of Tennessee, continuing the claims of Cherokee and other Indian heritage that people called Melungeon have avowed since the early 1800s. Swanson, White and Overall were left to keep the buffalo out of The first settler in the area that is now Knoxville was James White in 1786. Who were the early settlers of Tennessee? I wish you great success with your research. Kentucky at this time respectively belonged, had not yet been The National Museum of Human Rights in Memphis is inaugurated in the same place as the Lorraine Motel where Martin Luther King was assassinated, the 4th of April of 1968. James Robertson, a leader in the Cumberland military, invaded the land of the Chickamauga (Nickajack expedition), burned the villages and eliminated the threat in this region. of civilization across the western mountains. WebThousands of years before members of the historic tribes lived in Tennessee, their ancient ancestors lived here. With the battles of Mobile and Pensacola Jackson succeeds in expelling the British and marches toward New Orleans. The secret emissary was Dr. James White who had been appointment by the U.S. Government as the Superintendent of Indian Affairs in the south. The migration of European pioneers eventually brought about the end of Native American occupation along the river. The brisk winds cascading through the Beech trees embrace the scenery as they flow through the air in eastern Tennessee. exploration of the region. Indeed, the name Melungeon had until that time been used primarily by outsiders as a way to identify, and to belittle, a group within their community that appeared to be different. The first settler in Tennessee. The county of Sevier was established on September 10th, 1794. Like Soto, Pardo sought gold, but he also wanted to establish alliances with native tribes. William Bean and James Robertson were the early leaders of this group. was within the limits of Virginia. Our ancestors left an amazing trail to follow. the corporate limits of Nashville was selected as the site of White passed information to don Esteban Miro, Governor of Louisiana, that the leaders of Frankland and Cumberland had accepted enthusiastically the proposals by Gardoqui: pledge loyalty to Spain and renounce loyalty to other sovereignty or power. In spite of that English disaster, the French lost the war and all of the their leverage in North America and ceded to the English who claimed the right to all the lands east of the Mississippi River. Photo Courtesey of the North Carolina Office of Archives and History, Raleigh, NC. The Civil War ends. In spite of the leaving victorious, De Soto withdrew to the the north, past the Tennessee River so his men would be isolated and unable to escape to the ships. a more secure food supply, populations expanded rapidly and scattered bands combined to form larger villages. This restriction was eliminated in 1892 when the first women students were admitted. as the Archaic period, descendants of the Paleo-Indians began to settle on river terraces, where they gathered wild plant food and shellfish in addition Claimed arrivals range from the early 1790s to shortly after the turn of the 19th century. . Prohibition of alcohol production for one year. This became known as the Cherokee Cession of 1817. Early history examines the archaeological record that tells the story of the first inhabitants of Tennessee. Abraham Lincoln is elected President. rights," which could be bought for a small sum. This setting was known to the early settlers as they first stepped upon the soils of Tennessee. For the exclusive use and benefit of The American History and Genealogy Project. In spite of the leaving victorious, De Soto withdrew to the the north, past the Tennessee River so his men would be isolated and unable to escape to the ships. This story shows how far the leaders of eastern Tennessee settlements were willing to go to achieve independence. The first explorations by Europeans in what is now Tennessee took place in 1540, when a Spanish expedition under the command of Hernando de Soto entered the region from the southeast. everything in readiness for the coming of the second party. Blount College, the antecedent of the University of Tennessee, was established in Knoxville in 1794, two years before Tennessee became a state. Natives supplied deer and beaver hides to European traders in return for guns, rum and manufactured articles. Sakowski, Carolyn. It took place in Nashville, Tennessee, the 15th and 16th of December, 1864, between the Confederate Army of Tennessee under Lieutenant General John Bell Hood and the Federal forces under the command of Major General George J. Thomas. The sophisticated production of personal items and pottery are indicators of the complex society of the last prehistoric inhabitants of Tennessee. The construction of the fort was initiated during the spring of 1776. After the spending the winter in northern Florida and with news of gold in the direction of the rising sun, he headed northeast in the Spring of 1540, crossing Alabama, Georgia and the Carolinas. Georgia continues to allow the evictions and usurpation of their ancestral lands. Energy makes the world go round is the theme of the World Fair in Knoxville. These nomadic Paleo-Indians camped Introduction: East Tennessee: The first settlers moved into East Tennessee in violation of the Proclamation of 1763, which stated that land west of the proclamation line (most of what is now Middle Tennessee: James Robertson. Jackson brings a fundamental change to the politics of the White House that had previously been dominated by the aristocracy of Virginia and New England. This caused the native population to increase, and groups of nomadic hunters began to settle into larger villages. The primary objective of the long hunters was the acquisition of furs for the lucrative international fur market. North Carolina had used these lands to compensate revolutionary soldiers and the in the Acceptance of Cession (1789), it reserved the right to continue transferring land to its veterans in the territory of Tennessee. Tennessee still doesnt possess any railway mileage. The Overhill Cherokee lived in settlements located between the Appalachian Mountains and the Tennessee Valley in what is now Tennessee. Under the new federal constitution, the region was organized as the Territory South of the River Ohio. However, the primary sources tell another story entirely. Its original location has been the topic of debate for over two hundred years. Political cartoon featuring Andrew Jackson. (In the post-Civil War period, some persons of color commonly claimed Portuguese blood, associated with dark skin, as they sought to escape oppression as African Americans.) So if you are researching your family history in this area, be sure that youre looking in the correct location. led by Juan Pardo introduced firearms and deadly European diseases to the native populations. Please log in using one of these methods to post your comment: You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Cherokees John Ross (Tsanusdi), Colonel E. C. Boudinot Jr., Samuel Smith, Lilly Smith, Walini, Marcia Pascal, Lillian Gross, William Penn, and Thomas M. Cook. Knoxville was the capital since 1796. It does not store any personal data.
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